ST. LOUIS — Two Cardinals lefthanded starters who enjoyed summertime success for the club at different intervals this year took the mound for the final time this regular season Saturday night, not knowing if they would be back here anymore.
Jon Lester, 37, who won five starts in August and September to reach 200 wins for his career and help the Cardinals’ playoff push, blanked the Chicago Cubs for four innings before experiencing control issues in the fifth and surrendering a grand slam to Trayce Thompson.
Kwang Hyun Kim, 33, who won five starts in succession in late June and July to help keep the doddering Cardinals afloat, relieved Lester and worked two scoreless innings.
With a Busch Stadium season-high sellout crowd of 45,239 on hand, Lester didn’t receive the loss and Kim didn’t get credit for a win. The Cardinals rallied to take a 5-4 lead in the seventh but the Cubs’ Ian Happ drilled a 451-foot, two-run homer to dead center off Luis Garcia with two out in the ninth to present the Cubs with a 6-5 victory.
Pinch hitter Tommy Edman singled home one run in the seventh and, after stealing his 30th base, came around to score the go-ahead run on Dylan Carlson’s two-run single off Michael Rucker. All three runs were unearned as a result of a throwing error by Cubs shortstop Sergio Alcantara.
Edman is the first Cardinal to steal 30 bases since Edgar Renteria had 34 in 2003.
Young righthander Kodi Whitley, who does figure to be a prominent member of next year’s club, fired off a scoreless eighth to extend his scoreless streak to 15 2/3 innings. And Garcia, perhaps the surprise of the season, was headed for his third save when a walk and Happ’s 25th homer got in the way.
Former Cardinals prospect Rowan Wick earned the save for the Cubs, who had lost seven in succession to the Cardinals this season.
The Cardinals thus lost for only the third time in their past 24 games.
“This one still hurts,” said manager Mike Shildt. “But I’m appreciative of their overall body of work and that the guys are getting after it, regardless of circumstances.”
The Cardinals are unlikely to re-sign South Korean Kim, who is finishing up a two-year, $8 million deal and has been injured for several portions of the season. While lefthander J.A. Happ, who will be 39 next month, said he wanted to play next year, Lester said he hadn’t thought that far ahead.
“I’m not really worried about that right now,” Lester said. “I’m worried about hopefully having a deep run in the postseason. I’ll answer that stuff when the time comes.”
Speaking of both Lester and Kim, Shildt said, “Those guys have both been big contributors to our club. I thought ‘KK’ did a fantastic job in slowing that game down tonight.”
Though the Cardinals lost, they displayed a facet of their game which has been instrumental in their recent winning streak of 17 games. Their base running set up all three runs in the seventh, with Harrison Bader running hard to force a bad throw by Alcantara, Edman stealing second and Tyler O’Neill going to third when a Cubs outfielder’s throw went awry.
“Obviously, we wouldn’t have scored on Dylan’s hit if we hadn’t been on second and third,” said Edman. During the winning streak, Edman said the club consistently had “taken advantage of every little mistake the other team makes.”
Shildt said, “I can absolute appreciate that. They gave us an opportunity to bring it home. They worked their tails off. That’s what winners do.”
Promoted to the leadoff spot with Edman out of the starting lineup, Bader clouted the first leadoff homer of his-big-league career in the first inning. Bader sent a 3-1 sinker from Adrian Sampson over the left-field wall for his 16th homer.
Bader, who has tied Pittsburgh’s Bryan Reynolds at 23 for most hits against the Cubs this season, almost had a second homer an inning later but his fly to deep left landed a few short of the track and in the glove of Cubs left fielder Happ.
After Lester wriggled out of a bases-loaded, one-out spot in the fourth, he couldn’t survive the fifth.
Thompson crushed his grand slam after Lester had issued his third and fourth walks with two out to load the bases. Earlier in the inning, the Cubs had won a challenge that first baseman Paul Goldschmidt did not tag base runner Erick Castillo after third baseman Nolan Arenado had made a barehand grab and throw to first.
The Cubs took a 4-1 lead at the halfway point of a slow-moving game.
“I thought I threw the ball a lot better than what the line score said,” Lester offered. “I thought my sinker had a lot of movement on it but I just wasn’t able to command it in the (strike) zone.
“I’m still learning how to make adjustments with that and they made me pay. They honed (in) on pitches and made me throw strikes with that and I really wasn’t able to do it for the most part.”
But the Cardinals quickly rallied when Goldschmidt doubled and O’Neill tripled out of the reach of center fielder Johneshwy Fargas in the Cardinals’ fifth. After Arenado walked, however, Carlson grounded sharply up the middle where pitcher Trevor Megill speared the bouncer and started an inning-ending double play.
O’Neill, who had three hits on Friday, had two more on Saturday, including a single that kept the seventh-inning surge moving.
The capacity crowd got its money’s worth. “This place rocks,” said Shildt. “I’m excited for postseason baseball here. It’s great to have a full house in Busch Stadium. There are really few things better than that.”
